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Marco Rubio Wants To Permanently Extend NSA Mass Surveillance (nationaljournal.com)
SonicSpike writes: Marco Rubio wants Congress to permanently extend the authorities governing several of the National Security Agency's controversial spying programs, including its mass surveillance of domestic phone records. The Florida Republican and 2016 presidential hopeful penned an op-ed on Tuesday condemning President Obama's counterterrorism policies and warning that the U.S. has not learned the "fundamental lessons of the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001." Rubio called on Congress to permanently reauthorize core provisions of the post-9/11 USA Patriot Act, which are due to sunset on June 1 of this year and provide the intelligence community with much of its surveillance power. "This year, a new Republican majority in both houses of Congress will have to extend current authorities under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, and I urge my colleagues to consider a permanent extension of the counterterrorism tools our intelligence community relies on to keep the American people safe," Rubio wrote in a Fox News op-ed.
I don't remember one of the fundamental lessons of the 9/11 attacks being that we weren't watching everyone all the time without a warrant.
"Our two-party system is like a bowl of shit looking at itself in a mirror." - Lewis Black
If we should have learned anything from 9/11, it's that we should stop pushing terrible foreign policies on other nations. Also, stop meddling too much in their affairs. It is much easier to protect out nation by getting other countries to like us, instead of beating them into temporary submission.
Freedom is more important than safety. Privacy is a freedom that you are too willing to throw away. Please stop being such a pussy.
Thanks,
An American Citizen.
I hadn't read or heard much about this guy, but since he seems like he'll be the #3 between Cruz and Trump (who are both so unelectable it hurts) it's good to know that he's as awful a candidate as anyone else the Republicans have up.
...
Never expect anything from a politician, and you might be disappointed by them only half the time
It's time people started to accept this very important fact: being sellouts who want to sign away your rights is not a party issue.
They're all pretty much acting like it's better to live in fear in a surveillance state than it is to remember you can't "defend" freedoms by eliminating them.
Aren't these clowns all supposed to take an oath to defend and uphold the Constitution? Instead they're all deciding it doesn't apply.
Republicans, Democrats ... they're all happy to spy on everybody and act like it's normal.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
When you get goodies like warrantless searches, you never want to give them up. Like Ben Franklin said "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety". Never were truer words spoken. Next we'll be using methods we condemned Germany and China for to "monitor for threats". From this respect, it's true We haven't learned from national or world history.
"Imagination is more important than knowledge" - Einstein
Indeed. Our post WWII conduct with other countries was often extremely shameful. I termed my service as 'cleaning up the messes of our parents and grandparents'.
We should have a policy of conducting ourselves with honor - we make a deal, we keep it. We don't support people who are anti-ethical to our beliefs. Democracy isn't wrong, even if the population doesn't like us. Keep acting honorably and they'll eventually change their minds.
I don't read AC A human right
I fear that I will see in my lifetime the event that signifies the beginning of the end of the American Republic as Caesar's crossing of the Rubicon did for Rome's
Security lessons in the post 9/11 world: 1) Airline metal detection is worthless. 2) Espionage is more useful against Congress than against lone wolf terrorists. 3) It is very easy to use the threat of terrorism to get elected.
Also, throw in some bull about a 'new GOP dominated Senate' on the ridiculous belief that you will win, when the majority of polls continue to show the Democrats leading, and that the GOP would rather vote for crazy people like Trump and Cruz than elect a competent person.
excitingthingstodo.blogspot.com
Yes, his position can be summarized as:
- Obama failed by not spying on the innocent citizens enough;
- I propose we continue to spy on the innocent citizens, as Obama does, forever!
His political need to attack Obama results in an incoherent position statement.
I saw this coming the moment the US enacted the "temporary" Patriot Act, and I've reminded people every time they extended it. Once the government has power, they never give it back. I can't find examples to quote (other than the 1st Rule of Acquisition), but I'm sure everyone can think of at least five cases in history where this pattern has been repeated.
The only sane course of action when governments try to enact legislation like this, for any reason, is to block it at every available opportunity. These laws never get repealed, and the "temporary" emergency laws always become permanent.
Fuck 9/11. History already taught me that governments never waste a good opportunity to grab power, that all emergency powers become permanent, and that no government, ever, can be trusted with these powers.
"Government is like fire; a handy servant, but a dangerous master." -- George Washington
And then there's always "War is a Racket" by Marine Corp General and Commandant Smedly Butler. (Two Medal of Honor awards also). He was telling his story in the 1930s after the attempt to recruit him to run the Coup to depose FDR.
I think the hawkers of this isolationist ideal in foreign policy have a really short sighted view of the world and don't understand the real reasons why the USA is not viewed kindly in some places.
I don't think we are prepared to fully go isolationists or that we understand what that looks like. I think those that push this idea want their cake and eat it too. On one hand they will decry the so called abuses of our past interventions, but in their next breath will bitterly complain about us not taking actions to stop the massive waves of violence and death that would come if we went 100% hands off.
I also think we do stick our noses in places it doesn't belong and are fickle about what actions we do choose to make. Osama Bin Laden spoke of this fickle USA that would intervene one day to stop atrocities, then withdraw, leaving the locals to clean up the mess the next. Where the USA easily gets tired, looses it's resolve and goes away. He was right, we are driven by the news cycles and what's important to us now, doesn't matter next week, so that leads us to things like the Iraq war, where we went in, guns blazing with nearly 100% popular support after 9/11 to voting in some guy advocating we cut our losses and run, before the Iraqis where able to defend themselves. We depart, the situation falls apart as was expected, and now with the advent of ISIS we face a situation on the ground which is horrible for the people we liberated from Sadam. Yes it was and is our fault, and we all can agree on that regardless of if you think the war was wrong or if the premature departure was wrong.
Somewhere in all this there has got to be a balance between just not getting involved and being the world's policeman, between bombing the heck out of one group, arming another group or letting the world to it's own devices, regardless of how bad it looks.
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
I was thinking about this today for some reason. I came to the conclusion that wall Street backs Hillary because she was the original modern day wall street banker.
White Water was a land deal in which many people lost their savings on but Hillary came out pretty good. It was declared that she did nothing wrong so no charges were ever filled. Then she somehow made a mint from cattle futures but no one seems to be able to put how together. Fast forward to the financial collapse and we see similar things. Hillary is them, she was their mentor.
Please. Nobody in the GOP will ever be close to the center. They are all superconservative.
Most of the Democratic party is the closest thing the US has to being 'center'. Bernie Sanders is the only real leftwinger running, which in the US apparently equates to PINKO COMMIE.
a socialist trying to give away free everything to anybody
Sanders is not trying to "give away" anything. Nobody who supports Sanders expects to get things for "free", either. He openly states that taxes will have to go up or other parts of the budget will have to be cut. However, Sanders supporters are intelligent enough to realize that these are - absolutely and without challenge - the best investments that the government can possibly make. Money spent in prisons is never recouped. Money spent on education is recouped on average 5-10 times over (and often much more than that). Money spent on war is almost all lost. Money spent on health care is almost always returned.
The only people who think that Sanders is going to "give away" anything for "free" are the people who hate him too much to bother listening to what he actually says.
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.